A&M vows not to repeat last season’s swoon

1of 6Texas A&M quarterback Kyle Allen (10) throws a pass as Nevada defensive lineman Rykeem Yates (55) defends during the second half of an NCAA college football game Saturday, Sept. 19, 2015, in College Station, Texas.Photo: David J. Phillip /Associated Press

2of 6Texas A&M running back Tra Carson (5) rushes for a gain against Nevada during the first half of an NCAA college football game Saturday, Sept. 19, 2015, in College Station, Texas.Photo: David J. Phillip /Associated Press

3of 6Texas A&M offensive lineman Germain Ifedi (74) blocks Nevada defensive end Lenny Jones (94) during the first half of an NCAA college football game Saturday, Sept. 19, 2015, in College Station, Texas.Photo: David J. Phillip /Associated Press

4of 6Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin walks onto the field before an NCAA college football game against Nevada Saturday, Sept. 19, 2015, in College Station, Texas.Photo: David J. Phillip /Associated Press

5of 6Texas A&M quarterback Kyle Allen smiles before an NCAA college football game against Nevada Saturday, Sept. 19, 2015, in College Station, Texas.Photo: David J. Phillip /Associated Press

6of 6Texas A&M wide receiver Ricky Seals-Jones (9) goes through warm up drills before an NCAA college football game against Nevada Saturday, Sept. 19, 2015, in College Station, Texas.Photo: David J. Phillip /Associated Press

COLLEGE STATION — Texas A&M won its first five games last season and rose to No. 6 nationally, but it was the next three games the Aggies remember most.

“Last year was an eye-opener for us,” A&M senior center Mike Matthews said. “We were 5-0, and then really fell off bad. We understand that, and we’re not going to let that happen this year.”

Save for a mid-November nonconference game against Western Carolina, the Aggies (3-0) have finally set aside the pushovers for Southeastern Conference competition — with the notion they won’t repeat last year’s midseason dive.

“We’re about to go into the gauntlet,” offensive tackle Germain Ifedi said.

The No. 14 Aggies, who started the season unranked, face Arkansas (1-2) at 6 p.m. Saturday at AT&T Stadium in Arlington in both teams’ SEC opener. A&M’s setbacks last season didn’t start with the Razorbacks. In fact, the Aggies defeated Arkansas 35-28 in overtime in Arlington in one of their most rousing victories of the season.

The troubles started the next week, when Mississippi State crushed A&M 48-31 in Starkville, touching off a three-game losing streak that also included embarrassing defeats at home to Mississippi (35-20) and on the road at Alabama (59-0).

“We have a lot of players back who went through that last year, and it (stank),” Matthews said.

A&M coach Kevin Sumlin said last season’s swoon is openly addressed, with the idea that if history is ignored, it tends to repeat itself.

“You don’t assume anything,” Sumlin said when asked if the players needed a reminder of last year’s plunge. “We’ve got four or five (freshmen or newcomers) out there who weren’t playing last year. They probably think they’re pretty good right now.”

So how do the Aggies go about avoiding a rehash of 2014? They all said it starts with practice.

“Knowing what happened last year, we need to push even harder in practice, and prepare even more in practice, to not let that happen again,” Matthews said.

Added Sumlin: “What’s important is how we approach the next few weeks, and how we approach our team attitude in terms of where we last year. These guys that played well early — Armani Watts, Myles Garrett, Speedy Noil, Josh Reynolds, Donovan Wilson — things were coming pretty easy for them until the Arkansas game, and we still won.

“Then came the valley.”

Garrett, a sophomore defensive end with a nation-best 5½ sacks who’s earning early Heisman Trophy mention, said the players learned from the experience — and another year of growth in college certainly helps entering the “gauntlet” of league play.

“We’ve got another year under our belts in the weight room, we’re stronger and we’re faster, so we should be more prepared to go up against (the SEC),” Garrett said.

In their last two games, the Aggies have leaped to big leads against relative lightweights Ball State and Nevada before playing plenty of backups in the second half and finally prevailing 56-23 and 44-27, respectively.

A&M opened its season with an impressive victory over Pac-12 opponent Arizona State, 38-17, so sophomore quarter Kyle Allen said the Aggies know how to get up for weightier opponents.

“You could see when we played Arizona State, how ready we were for that game,” Allen said.

A&M’s schedule the rest of the way sets up very favorably for a run at an SEC title, and Arkansas has already lost to Toledo and Texas Tech.

“Really, it’s pretty simple, you try to concentrate on the task at hand,” Razorbacks coach Bret Bielema said of overcoming their own set of troubles so early in the season. “The (let’s just be) 1-0 this week mentality should really help us out in this scenario.”

A&M follows up the game in Arlington with home contests against Mississippi State and Alabama.

The Aggies, despite being the lone team from Texas in the SEC, don’t even leave the state until Oct. 24, when they play at Mississippi. As valuable as a favorable schedule? A&M vows its experience of last year — when the losses made more of an impression than the wins.

“We know that taste it left in our mouth,” Matthews said, “and it’s not something we want to go through again.”

Brent Zwerneman is a staff writer for the Houston Chronicle and chron.com covering Texas A&M athletics. He is a graduate of Oak Ridge High School and Sam Houston State University, where he played baseball.

Brent is the author of four published books about Texas A&M, three related to A&M athletics. He’s a four-time winner of APSE National Top 10 writing awards for the San Antonio Express-News, including a second-place finish for breaking the Dennis Franchione “secret newsletter” scandal in 2007.

His coverage of Texas A&M’s move to the SEC from the Big 12 also netted a third-place finish nationally in 2012. Brent met his wife, KBTX-TV news anchor Crystal Galny, in the Dixie Chicken before an A&M-Texas Tech football game in 2002, and the couple has three children: Will, Zoe and Brady.